Term 2 EPS Return to School Update

Dear Parents and Carers

I hope all is well with you and your families and that you have enjoyed some quality time together during the holiday period.

Over the past few days there have been a number of announcements from the Premier and the NSW Education Minister that schools will undertake a 'managed return' of students to school from Monday 11 May 2020 (Week 3, Term 2). Schools have also been allocated an additional Staff Development Day, Tuesday 28 April 2020 to support planning. The following is an outline of current developments.

Staff Development Days: Monday 27th and Tuesday 28th April 2020, staff only. Term 2 commences for students on Wednesday 29^th April 2020.

Term 2 Weeks 1 and 2: Students continue to ‘learn from home’ as they did at the end of Term 1. Students in Yrs 3-6 will return to online learning via Classroom and K-2 students will commence online learning via Classroom.

The school remains open for students of essential workers. Supervision will be available for these students as they engage in the same learning as the students ‘learning at home’. Parents are encouraged, as announcement by the Premier, ‘to keep their children at home if possible’.

Access: Families inform the school if they require a device or a work pack if accessibility is an issue and these will be arranged. Families email the school for support if they encounter difficulties.

Attendance: Parents are required to inform the school or class teacher when their child is sick and unable to engage in learning from home on a particular day/s. Families are contacted by the class teacher when after 3 days a student has not engaged in their learning from home.

Term 2 Week 3: Every student will have the opportunity to start attending school one day a week, with around 25% of students in attendance on any given day. This will be with strict guidelines around social distancing and hygiene being adhered to.

Schools will manage the structure of this 'managed return' for their own specific context. In other words, the Premier and Department of Education (DoE) expects that every school will do this differently.

You would appreciate the high level of complexity involved in developing structures and protocols for a 'managed return'. I would respectfully request that you keep in mind that whatever we do will fall short of the benefits of a full return to face-to-face teaching. The school's leadership team is working together with the DoE over the coming week to create an Earlwood Public School model that we will communicate to you via Skoolbag and the school website.

The Premier has stated that children should be kept at home, except for their ‘rostered day’ and has asked parents to ‘respect the guidelines’ that will be established by the school. Please note that this does not apply to those students who need to attend each day.

We are appreciative of the support and understanding that we have received from parents during these unprecedented times in education. I know how challenging this has been for our students and their families. I would also like to thank the extraordinary staff of EPS who have gone above and beyond to learn and implement new platforms and quickly design new content for their students to ensure some continuity in teaching and learning.

Phases of the 'managed return' to school:  This guide for families is attached with this message. It is an outline from the NSW Department of Education of the proposed phases of the 'managed return' of students to school. Phase 0 is what we will have for the first two weeks of Term 2 and Phase 1 will begin in Week 3.

Stay tuned for further updates and we look forward to reconnecting with our students next week.

Take care and kind regards

Mrs Angel